Death in Her Hands

“How hard was it to imagine a small golden locket glinting between sodden birch leaves, the chain broken and dashed through the new, tender, hairy grass? The locket could contain photos of a young, gap-toothed child on one side—Magda at age five—and a man in a military hat on the other, her father, I’d guess.”

Upon finding the note, Vesta’s mind immediately begins to invent a backstory for the victim, illustrating the theme of The Unreliable Mind as Author of Reality. The use of a rhetorical question signals that this process is not an investigation of facts but a creative act, as she populates the empty narrative with specific, sentimental details like a “golden locket.” This initial impulse to author a story, rather than report a potential crime, establishes the novel’s central psychological trajectory.

“Walter had always told me that when I got emotional, it put a great strain on my heart. ‘Danger zone,’ he’d say, and insist on putting me to bed and turning down the lights, drawing the curtains closed if it was daytime. ‘Best to lie down and rest until the fit passes.’”

Considering whether to report the note, Vesta recalls her late husband’s controlling response to her emotions, revealing how her past informs her present actions. The dialogue attributed to Walter demonstrates a history of psychological suppression, framing her emotional responses as a medical condition requiring isolation and containment. This memory serves as an early link between the invented mystery of Magda and the subconscious processing of Vesta’s own history of being controlled and dismissed.